As I’ve droned on about in previous posts, I try with the graphics I develop to allow them to evolve as much as possible through uncritical acceptance and response to thoughts that spontaneously cross my mind while I work. My thinking is that such thoughts reflect unconscious intentions, and that by giving them visual expression I have an opportunity to examine and speculate upon what the greater portion of my psyche is up to. Most … perhaps all … of my previous graphic compositions have included overtly symbolic components which I have enjoyed ruminating over, all the while being careful not to hold on too tight to any particular interpretation that might occur to me on the assumption that if what I’m examining is indeed an expression of unconscious material its meaning can never fully be grasped.
I tinkered with the image above for a little more than eight weeks. Off and on during the effort, in response to mild befuddlement at the emerging naturalistic scene I was authoring, I toyed with the idea of injecting some sort of mysterious element or other. Perhaps out there on the slope leading down to the ocean the shaman featured in a previous post might make an appearance. Or maybe three tall, lean pillars or stelae suggesting, in my imagination, a place of worship of the Fates. But every conscious (so they seemed to me) attempt at willful mystification I tried read as trivial Mickey Mouse distractions from what I was otherwise coming to appreciate as simply a pleasantly tranquil scene.
And now in the standing-back-from-the-work-and-considering phase, I wonder why I feel that pleasant tranquility is enough. In this instance, for me that seems to be the mysterious component. Perhaps the “big picture” is whispering … something I may not have really listened to before. Perhaps something like, if I let it, pleasant tranquility can be wrought through interactions in the world over time. Maybe a pointer to a potential upside of old age.